First Person Servers

PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds is quickly becoming one of the most hardcore competitive online shooters on the market right now, and like all good competitive games, there is potential for a significant esports scene. While Battlegrounds definitely suffers from a lot of issues that plague most early access games at the moment, they’ve already hosted a charity tournament, and some streamers have been hosting tournaments of their own.

The only thing holding Battlegrounds back from a legitimate esports scene, other than its full release, is the lack of a first-person-only server/mode. This is probably the most requested feature by the community, mostly because the third-person perspective in Battlegrounds offers arguably unfair advantages to campers. Although the game allows you to switch in and out of first-person at the moment, you play at a huge disadvantage if you choose to use first-person only against players who are using third-person. Since it’s not viable, virtually everyone is forced to play in third person and adapt.

Battlegrounds needs a first-person-only server so people don’t have to go looking for custom games. It would offer a totally fresh gameplay experience compared to third-person, and would most likely open the game up to a larger esports potential.

This post was originally written by Jesse Cecchetto.

Optimization

Many, if not most early access games suffer from poor optimization, and PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds is no different. In case you didn’t know, before Battlegrounds was released onto Steam Early access a couple of months ago, it was the product of nine months of development. It took nine months to create Battlegrounds from scratch to the point of entering early access. While this is an incredibly impressive accomplishment, it also means that there was bound to be a plethora of issues with the game, mostly revolving around optimization.

Even popular streamers with the most powerful rigs available still encounter lag, fps drops, and delay, also attributed to the slow servers. The thing that PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds needs more than anything at the moment, is optimization. Hopefully, Bluehole Studio works on PC optimization, before working on porting it to console like other early access titles have done in the past. Bluehole studio has raked in millions, and if their success is to continue, people need to be able to play the game on higher than “very low” settings without a multi-thousand dollar computer.

More Maps

Currently, PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds only has one map, but it’s an immensely vast and detailed one, to say the least. In its current state, a new map definitely isn’t the priority, but if the game is to stay fresh, another map option would be a huge deal. Battlegrounds has been out for a few months now, and its hardcore player base has memorized most, if not all of the map, including vehicle spawns, and loot spawns, including which buildings are more fortifiable than others.

Bluehole Studio most likely has huge plans for the future of the game due to its overwhelming success, and it wouldn’t be outlandish to assume that they have another map in the works for the foreseeable future, it’s just a matter of time.

New Game Modes

Currently, Battlegrounds is a battle royale, fight to the death scenario where the last man/woman out of 100 people standing wins. At the moment, you can play solo, duo or with a squad of four. Solo with a doubt provides the most challenging gameplay experience possible since your survival is entirely dependent on your own abilities. Being the sole survivor out of one hundred other bloodthirsty competitors is not an easy accomplishment, but is it ever rewarding.

Playing with a friend, and with a squad is definitely a nice change of pace from solo, but it’s still the same formula, just with a different number of teammates. What Battlegrounds needs, especially for the less competent players, are different game modes. Smaller game modes that make for faster games, with a smaller portion of the map and fewer players, would offer a great change of pace from the normal thirty minute or longer games. Game mode’s such as, 10 versus 10 or 20 versus 20 would be incredibly unique for the battle royale genre, and would offer a new level of competition based on communication.

Casual & Ranked Mode

Currently, PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds is a ranked-only game. This means that every single game you play in Battlegrounds will count towards your overall rank, and your general statistics will be recorded. Your rank can be seen on the global leaderboards, and it also determines the skill level of other players that you match with. Lower ranked players can expect to find matches very quickly, while top tier players may have a harder time.

Battlegrounds is in desperate need of a casual game mode, free from the anxiety and frustration of ranking. Ranked matches can get pretty stressful, and when your actions are constantly being recorded, it can make for some pretty frustrating situations. Having a casual game mode would make for a more relaxed experience, while also providing an outlet for players to practice. At the same time, it also needs a more relevant and meaningful ranking system. Similar to H1Z1 King Of The Kill, and many other ranked competitive games, player’s should receive some kind of plaque or symbol associated with their rank. It’s not only something to work towards and feel proud of, but it’s also a way to separate players by brackets, instead of relying on on a simple number scale.